Try getting a reservation at Dorsia now! RIP Paul, too soon
You've mistaken him for that dickhead Marcus Halberstram
Paul Allen has died
281–290 of 308 posts
Re: Paul Allen has died
#282One of the first people to sign on to the Giving Pledge. Worth 20 billion according to wiki. Owns the Seattle Seahawks and the Trailblazers. Will these be sold off? Will be a true test of the Pledge.
NFL rules require that an NFL team have a majority owner (with Green Bay grandfathered as an exception). It will likely have to be sold.
Could it be a Corp or an NGO ? Or does it have to be a natural person?
Re: Paul Allen has died
#283I had an opportunity to work at both the Allen Institute for Artificial Intelligence (AI2) and the Allen Institute for Brain Science (AIBs). I was part of the 10 year strategic planning efforts at AI2. Paul Allen was both involved and hands-off in the support of the leadership AI2 and AIBs. It was a rare balance and Paul Allen knew how to create the conditions for innovation and novel research breakthroughs with micr…
> In Seattle, it was hard to not run into the influence of Paul Allen. From the Seattle Seahawks to the Museum of Popular Culture (MoPoP), Paul Allen had an impact everywhere in Seattle. The whole South Lake Union urban office park that Amazon now dominates was Paul Allen's work also. (see https://www.seattletimes.com/business/timeline-of-paul-allen... )
Only after Seattle voters rejected his much better Seattle Commons plan though (http://www.historylink.org/File/8252). Shame really.
Re: Paul Allen has died
#284Many here have noted his many large-scale philanthropic efforts, which are fantastic, and often benefit our whole species. But my personal favorite, even if it doesn't benefit large swaths of humanity in the same way as a cell research insitute: https://livingcomputers.org/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Living_Computers:_Museum_%2B_L... It's a computer museum, but they work. They're turned on, and you can use them! Y…
They have a working Xerox Alto with the original suite of Smalltalk programs as described in Personal Dynamic Media (Kay and Goldberg 1977)!
I had just been reading about the history of Xerox Parc when I went to the museum, and being able to then use that machine was the most magical experience I've had in a museum.
Thanks Paul and everyone else who makes the Living Computers Museum live.
Re: Paul Allen has died
#285When I was a kid, programmers - the elders, those whose lives and achievements had been described in all my introductory books - seemed to be immortal, because all these people who changed the world and created the wonderful universe of computers and software - they were all alive then (at least those I knew and cared about). That time is long gone now... and we are no longer immortal. We have lost so many of our kin…
It was weird discovering Lisp and seeing that the creators were still alive. It was weird learning C and seeing that the creators were still alive.
I fear there will be many more black bars in our future...
Re: Paul Allen has died
#286Earlier quoted context omitted.
> In Seattle, it was hard to not run into the influence of Paul Allen. From the Seattle Seahawks to the Museum of Popular Culture (MoPoP), Paul Allen had an impact everywhere in Seattle. The whole South Lake Union urban office park that Amazon now dominates was Paul Allen's work also. (see https://www.seattletimes.com/business/timeline-of-paul-allen... )
Only after Seattle voters rejected his much better Seattle Commons plan though ( http://www.historylink.org/File/8252 ). Shame really.
Seattle voters have a track record of rejecting good things. See: The Rapid Transit Plan from the 70s.
At least we passed ST3...
Re: Paul Allen has died
#287What an incredible loss on so many levels. 65 is young but look at everything he did and his contributions speak for themselves. R.I.P. Paul and Godspeed
Re: Paul Allen has died
#288Earlier quoted context omitted.
Like Arthur Kane, bass player for the New York Dolls. Goes to the hospital thinking he has the flu, is diagnosed with leukemia, 2 hours - HOURS - later, he dies.
Last time I went to the doctor with extreme flu like symptoms (Pretty sure I had pneumonia) the doctor treated me like I was wasting her time and actually ridiculed me. Hearing stuff like this stresses me the heck out. This was the often praised UK NHS btw
I think I'd change doctors if I were you.
Re: Paul Allen has died
#289What an incredible loss on so many levels. 65 is young but look at everything he did and his contributions speak for themselves. R.I.P. Paul and Godspeed
To think he was told he was going to die so many years go, yet it still never stopped him from having ambitions as large as we have come to realize today.
Re: Paul Allen has died
#290Outside of his work at Microsoft, I was mainly aware of him through his ownership of the Seattle Sounders in MLS. I live in the UK, where we have world-class football teams aplenty, but I think the Sounders were the first team in MLS that I saw that had the ownership and the facilities to be taken seriously in any league around the world. It's a shame CNBC missed his ownership of that team, because he's done as great…
I'm glad you mentioned the Sounders, because nobody else has.
I grew up in the Seattle area, and the constant threats of sports teams leaving (Mariners, Sonics, Seahawks) were sort of tiring. As a kid, I was thrilled to see the Mariners stay (Nintendo backed that one, IIRC) and enjoyed the new stadium. The Sonics got away (I'm guessing Allen already owned the Blazers at the time..?) but he was instrumental in keeping the Seahawks.
Around the time CenturyLink field was built, the Sounders became an MLS team. I don't remember the exact history, and I left Seattle around that time, but it's been awesome to see Seattle rally behind a top notch soccer team; the fan base is one of the strongest in the US, and the regional rivalry with the Portland Timbers and Vancouver Whitecaps is a lot of fun to follow.
To be honest, the Sounders have the kind of following and give the city the kind of energy any city would be proud to have.